How Two of My Mighty Teams Have Fallen

So while I was joking about Sarah and I waking up early to catch the Korea vs. Taiwan World Baseball Classic matchup, I really did catch the Korea vs. Japan matchup on early Saturday morning. Sophia's going through a "I think I'll wake up at 5am" stage, so at around 6am I went downstairs with the kids, fed them breakfast, and caught part of the Korea vs. Japan game on ESPN2. I figure it's always nice for Daniel and Sophia to see that people of their heritage can play sports at a high-caliber. Yes kids, someday you too can play in the Tokyo Dome with 55,000 people banging on drums, chanting in unison a language you don't understand.

I was watching the ESPN2 ticker (a moving banner at the bottom of the screen which scrolls sports news and results) and two things stood out to me. First, in college basketball hoops, Cornell had clinched a berth to the NCAA tournament by crushing Penn 83-59, marking the the first time since 1958-59 (Dartmouth) that any team besides Penn or Princeton had repeated as Ivy League champions. The fact that Penn got creamed by 24 points in the clinching game simply added insult to injury. My time at Penn was spoiled with three Ivy League championships and one NCAA tournament win vs. Nebraska during the Jerome Allen and Matt Maloney glory days. 

Even after I left Penn, Coach Fran Dunphy consistently recruited and put a contending team on the floor winning a slew of Ivy titles afterwards. Dunphy left to coach Temple and Glen Miller arrived, taking Dunphy's recruits to the tournament the first year, after which point the wheels completely came off. Penn hasn't sniffed the title in the past two years, with Penn's record an ugly 9-17 and 5-7 in the league. It's gotten so bad that a Fire Glen Miller website has emerged, which is actually pretty funny.

Second, China beat Taiwan 4-1 in the World Baseball Classic, eliminating Taiwan from the tournament having lost their first two games. Getting unceremoniously dumped out of an international tournmanet is bad enough, but losing to the country which has historically made thinly veiled comments to invade or launch missiles into your country in the name of "forced reunification" is simply horrible. The people of Taiwan are still smarting over their humiliating baseball loss to China at the 2008 Olympics, an upset so stunning given Taiwan's proud history in the sport (don't you remember their past domination in the Little League World Series?) and China's newcomer status.

Well, at least I still have my Millburn Mustangs.